Putin's Master Plan. Douglas E. Schoen

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СКАЧАТЬ Putin can exploit.⁴¹ Macedonia and Serbia are less integrated into the European system and have strong nationalist movements that view Russia as a traditional ally and natural protector.⁴² Putin has high hopes that he can convert these relationships into lasting political influence that secures Russian interests in the heart of the Balkans and guarantees him a say in all European discussions.

       CENTRAL EUROPE

      Putin’s strategy for Central Europe is focused on exploiting institutional weaknesses in former communist states, such as Hungary and Slovakia, while neutralizing wealthier and more powerful countries, such as Germany and Austria. Hungary’s president, Viktor Orbán, who has vowed to create an “illiberal state”⁴³ and openly repudiates the European and Western values at the center of the European Union, has become Putin’s closest ally in Europe and a dangerous threat to the future of the EU.⁴⁴ Slovakia’s economy is dominated by oligarchs who do considerable business with Russia, making the country a prime target for Putin’s intrigues.⁴⁵ Slovak politicians have little desire to become Russian puppets, but they’re wary of alienating a vital trading partner.⁴⁶ Putin has taken advantage of Slovakia’s hesitancy to rail against EU sanctions on trade with Russia, where Slovakia or Hungary are both capable of ending the EU’s consensus-based sanctions. It would be a political coup for Putin if they did so.

      The Germans may be more wary of Russia than any other country in the world, having fought two devastating wars against Russia in the past century. As such, Putin’s goal is not necessarily to encourage a close relationship between Germany and Russia, though he will take anything he can get, but rather to rupture the close relationship that Germany has with the United States. By encouraging far-left and far-right strains of anti-American politics and rhetoric in Germany, Putin hopes to drive the two countries far enough apart that NATO becomes functionally inoperable and America’s military presence in Europe is compromised. The Germans continue to depend heavily on Russian energy to power their economy,⁴⁷ which in turn drives the European economy. Putin hopes to set up a choice whereby Germany pursues its economic relationship with Russia over its political relationship with America. If Putin succeeds, he will be that much closer to “Finlandizing” the European continent and ending the transatlantic relationship.

       WESTERN EUROPE

      Putin sponsors a range of insurgent political organizations in Western Europe—extremists, nationalists, separatists, and anti-Western and anti-American groups—in order to promote anti-EU policies and disrupt the ability of Western European leaders to formulate a cohesive response to Russian aggression further east. In Britain, the UK Independence Party, or UKIP, received 13 percent of the vote in the 2015 elections⁴⁸ despite openly endorsing Putin’s illegal invasion and annexation of Crimea,⁴⁹ and subsequently championed the Brexit vote to leave the EU. France, Britain, Spain, Italy, and Belgium all have populist political parties that are “committed” to Putin.⁵⁰ The right-wing National Front party in France has been loaned tens of millions of euros by a Kremlin-connected bank, and Putin has hosted the National Front’s leader, Marine Le Pen, in Moscow.⁵¹ A January 2015 poll finds that between 29 and 31 percent of French voters would support Le Pen if she runs for president in 2017, putting her ahead of all other contenders.⁵² Radical pro-Putin parties are poised to grow in popularity in Europe as economic woes, dissatisfaction with immigration policy, and frustration with the status quo discredits mainstream political parties on both the left and right.

      For a glimpse of the future of Western European politics, just look at Greece. The country’s far-left SYRIZA party and neofascist Golden Dawn party disagree on just about everything—but they both love Putin⁵³ What Putin hopes to offer the voters of Western Europe is just that: a choice on everything except whether to stand up to Russia and defend their own own values. He figures that if core European states such as France and Britain elect governments that include Putin loyalists, NATO will be as good as dead. The thinking is that a Le Pen government that is pro-Putin would never send its troops to protect Estonia from a Russian invasion or endorse another round of sanctions on Russian-backed separatists. Pro-Putin Western European governments would also roll back efforts to reduce reliance on Russian energy and happily send their euros and pounds east to fill the Kremlin’s coffers. Putin, of course, will be generous enough not to turn off the gas during cold European winters, so long as his customers keep playing by his rules.

      It follows that Western Europe’s pro-Putin politicians would also undermine their nations’ foundational relationship with America, closing military bases and ending long-standing cooperative defense arrangements. We may even see a repeat of France’s Cold War–era decision to decline participation in mutual defense arrangements with America. If that were the case, how could the United States trust pro-Putin politicians on basic matters of political decency and respect for human rights? It is one thing when politicians hold their noses for the sake of national commercial benefit, as many countries do with China. But when politicians throw in their lot with Putin, whose chief export has been war and bloodshed, they put at stake their very existence as liberal democracies, to say nothing of forfeiting any claim to a moral high ground. Simply put, Putin’s meddling in Western Europe poses a threat to the future of the Western alliance—and with it, the future of Western civilization.

       THE MIDDLE EAST

      Putin has many reasons to be interested in the Middle East, including global oil supplies and Russia’s lucrative arms sales in the region. But Putin’s overriding strategic priority in the Middle East concerns Iran, the world’s largest Shi’a Muslim nation. Not that Putin has any special love for Iran or its particular brand of Shi’a theocracy. What Iran represents is the gravest threat to American interests in the Middle East and the ability to shatter America’s regional alliance system. Moreover, Iran stands as a counterweight to Turkey, and has the power to destabilize the Caucasus region, where Shi’a Muslims in Azerbaijan and southern Russia look to Tehran for religious, cultural, and even political leadership. For these reasons, Putin supplies Iran with arms, nuclear technology, and diplomatic support that continue to be a decisive factor in the country’s emergence as a regional power.

      Russia’s direct support for Bashar al-Assad in Syria has been conducted in clear collaboration with Iran, and Iranian military advisors on the ground direct Syrian troops armed by Putin. Today, Iran is in effective control of coastal Syria, Lebanon, the Shi’a regions of Iraq, and areas of Yemen ruled by Tehran-backed ethnic Houthi rebels. A member of Iran’s parliament has declared that the country now controls four Arab capitals: Baghdad, Damascus, Beirut, and Sana’a.⁵⁴

      Understandably, America’s Arab allies are alarmed by Iran’s rise, which has deeply upset the balance of power in the Middle East. Egypt and Saudi Arabia, two powerful Arab nations and natural rivals with Iran, are determined to reassert their influence and roll back Iranian gains. But they aren’t turning to America for help. Instead, they’re running straight into Putin’s arms. The Saudi royal family, who have become “disillusioned with President Obama and his policies in the region,” recently dispatched Deputy Crown Prince and Minister of Defense Mohammed bin Salman to Moscow to negotiate deals with Putin on “oil cooperation, space cooperation, peaceful nuclear energy cooperation, and nuclear technology sharing.⁵⁵ In addition, Egypt recently signed a sweeping military cooperation agreement with Russia, and Cairo plans to buy billions of dollars of arms from the Kremlin.⁵⁶ Egyptian and Russian officers will train together, and their navies will hold joint exercises in the Mediterranean.⁵⁷ Putin is working all sides of the conflict in the Middle East, to the detriment of American security interests—and no one is batting an eye in Washington.

      America’s Middle Eastern allies can no longer rely on Washington for material or diplomatic support. Instead, they’re flocking to Putin for arms and technology. Putin’s alliance with Iran demonstrated the value of the Kremlin’s friendship, and is upending a regional order that has persisted largely unchanged for decades. СКАЧАТЬ